More Do Not Track options are coming to Firefox. But will they have any impact?
Mozilla

Firefox has readied a more nuanced approach to how it implements the controversial "Do Not Track" setting and the Android version of the browser has a new font face in the browser's latest betas.

Firefox 21 Beta (download for Windows, Mac, and Linux) introduces more user choice for the Do Not Track header. The header, first introduced two years ago in Firefox 4, sends a signal to Web sites to not track where people who have activated it go as they bop around the Web.

If the signal is not sent, we are not communicating either of these things.

Firefox 21 gives you those three choices. "When DNT is off, it doesn't mean 'please track me.' It means that the user hasn't told the browser their choice yet," Lowenthal wrote. When you install Firefox for the first time, he said, the browser is set to neither so that the choice is entirely the user's.

What's not clear is how sites react to that. Do Web sites that receive no Do Not Track preference actually not track you? It may be that Mozilla is attempting to create that response, but Web sites have been issuing cookies to follow you around since long before the concept of Do Not Track even existed. That's not to say that a more user-respectful approach to DNT isn't a good idea, but it's hardly how the Web currently works.

You can toggle your DNT preferences under Options and then the Privacy tab.

More important is Mozilla's recent announcement that upcoming versions of Firefox will block third-party tracking cookies by default. That feature is due in the Firefox 22 Aurora build, expected tomorrow, and should be in the Firefox stable around July.

Another big change in Firefox 21 will be the basic implementation of the "Firefox Health Report," a feature that will tell you how to better optimize your Firefox customizations. Smaller changes include support for HTML5's tag, and an option to restore a deleted thumbnail from the New Tab page.

About the author

Senior writer Seth Rosenblatt covered Google and security for CNET News, with occasional forays into tech and pop culture. Formerly a CNET Reviews senior editor for software, he has written about nearly every category of software and app available.
See full bio